The International Human Rights and Conflict Resolution Clinic of Stanford Law School and the Global Justice Clinic at New York University School of Law released a report in December entitled: Living Under Drones. The UK charity Reprieve apparently requested the study in order to better serve the Pakistani people; researchers spent nine months doing interviews with locals on the ground, and examining reams of documents. These are the lead sentence headings of their basic findings; recommendations are included, plus much, much more.

First, while civilian casualties are rarely acknowledged by the US government, there is significant evidence that US drone strikes have injured and killed civilians.

Second, US drone strike policies cause considerable and under-accounted-for harm to the daily lives of ordinary civilians, beyond death and physical injury.

Third, publicly available evidence that the strikes have made the US safer overall is ambiguous at best.

Fourth, current US targeted killings and drone strike practices undermine respect for the rule of law and international legal protections and may set dangerous precedents.

In light of these concerns, this report recommends that the US conduct a fundamental re-evaluation of current targeted killing practices, taking into account all available evidence, the concerns of various stakeholders, and the short and long-term costs and benefits.

From the ‘daily life under-accounted-for harm’ section is this unsurprising but horrific paragraph:

Drones hover twenty-four hours a day over communities in northwest Pakistan, striking homes, vehicles, and public spaces without warning. Their presence terrorizes men, women, and children, giving rise to anxiety and psychological trauma among civilian communities. Those living under drones have to face the constant worry that a deadly strike may be fired at any moment, and the knowledge that they are powerless to protect themselves. These fears have affected behavior. The US practice of striking one area multiple times, and evidence that it has killed rescuers, makes both community members and humanitarian workers afraid or unwilling to assist injured victims.

There are days that mothers keep their children keep their beloved children home from school when the drones sound closer….or there is fear of some retribution that gets passed from person to person, village to village. Children are said to wet their beds in fear at night; small wonder. I’d guess they might during the day as well.

The report’s Voices from Below: Accounts of Three Drone Strikes gives eyewitness reports of three strikes as well as evidence conflicting ‘official’ reports. The sections on the practice of ‘double taps’ making rescue fraught is stunningly hideous, and are the interviews in the ‘Mental Health’ section. One paragraph:

Ahmed Jan summarized the impact: “Before the drone attacks, it was as if everyone was young. After the drone attacks, it is as if everyone is ill. Every person is afraid of the drones.” One mother who spoke with us stated that, although she had herself never seen a strike, when she heard a drone fly overhead, she became terrified. “Because of the terror, we shut our eyes, hide under our scarves, put our hands over our ears.” When asked why, she said, “Why would we not be scared?”[snip]

In addition to feeling fear, those who live under drones–and particularly interviewees who survived or witnessed strikes–described common symptoms of anticipatory anxiety and post-traumatic stress disorder. Interviewees described emotional breakdowns, running indoors or hiding when drones appear above, fainting, nightmares and other intrusive thoughts, hyper startled reactions to loud noises, outbursts of anger or irritability, and loss of appetite and other physical symptoms. Interviewees also reported suffering from insomnia and other sleep disturbances, which medical health professionals in Pakistan stated were prevalent. A father of three said, “drones are always on my mind. It makes it difficult to sleep. They are like a mosquito. Even when you don’t see them, you can hear them, you know they are there.” According to a strike survivor, “When the drone is moving, people cannot sleep properly or can’t rest properly. They are always scared of the drones.”

In related news, the Washington Postreported on January 19 that the official counterterrorism ‘playbook’ that is under development by the Obomba administration is nearing completion. It will establish ‘clear rules’ for targeted killings, and iis a year-long effort to ‘codify its counterterrorism policies and create a guide for lethal operations through Obama’s second term’.

‘The adoption of a formal guide to targeted killing marks a significant — and to some uncomfortable — milestone: the institutionalization of a practice that would have seemed anathema to many before the Sept. 11 , 2001, terrorist attacks.

Jim Lobe at IPS News quotes former to CIA analyst for the Middle East and SE Asia Paul Pillar, who questions the value of the ‘playbook’ on his blog, which I read rather as ‘the pragmatism of the ‘playbook’:

“Having a playbook on assassinations sounds like it is apt to be a useful guide for making the quick decision whether to pull the trigger on a Hellfire missile when a suspected terrorist is in the sights of a drone. But it probably will not, as far as we know, be of any help in weighing larger important issues such as whether such a killing is likely to generate more future anti-U.S. terrorism because of the anger over collateral casualties than it will prevent taking a bad guy out of commission.”

“By routinizing and institutionalizing a case-by-case set of criteria, there is even the hazard that officials will devote less deliberation than they otherwise would have to such larger considerations because they have the comfort and reassurance of following a manual,” he wrote.

Ya think? Jeremy Scahill in Yemen gets it in spades: he sees it on the ground! The Washington Post is starting to get it. Even the New York Times gets it; the authors mentioned it in their May 29 puff-piece that ‘normalized’ Terror Tuesday. Noting that he couldn’t be bothered with making a legislative deal to close Guantanamo, but is dogged in turning his lawyerly skills toward assassinating ‘al Qaeda’, comes this:

Beside the president at every step is his counterterrorism adviser, John O. Brennan, who is variously compared by colleagues to a dogged police detective, tracking terrorists from his cavelike office in the White House basement, or a priest whose blessing has become indispensable to Mr. Obama, echoing the president’s attempt to apply the “just war” theories of Christian philosophers to a brutal modern conflict.

But the strikes that have eviscerated Al Qaeda — just since April, there have been 14 in Yemen, and 6 in Pakistan — have also tested both men’s commitment to the principles they have repeatedly said are necessary to defeat the enemy in the long term. Drones have replaced Guantánamo as the recruiting tool of choice for militants; in his 2010 guilty plea, Faisal Shahzad, who had tried to set off a car bomb in Times Square, justified targeting civilians by telling the judge, “When the drones hit, they don’t see children.”

Dennis C. Blair, director of national intelligence until he was fired in May 2010, said that discussions inside the White House of long-term strategy against Al Qaeda were sidelined by the intense focus on strikes. “The steady refrain in the White House was, ‘This is the only game in town’ — reminded me of body counts in Vietnam,” said Mr. Blair, a retired admiral who began his Navy service during that war.”

There do seem to be some tensions that have developed over Obomba’s drone policy, but more concerning who adds names to the Kill Lists, ‘legal principles that govern assassinating US citzens overseas, transparency, efficacy, which agencies should run the program, i.e. the CIA’s virtual autonomy on the Predator strikes in Yemen and Somalia, etc., rather than questions of Constitutionality, international law, and so forth. The CIA drone program operates totally in the dark, and is allowed to by Congressional statute.

Incoming Director of the CIA John Brennan is allegedly a proponent of transparency and ‘rigorous review’ of the strikes (God save us all), and yet has overseen a significant expansion of them. As the ‘playbook’ seems to be his baby, so to speak, Obomba obviously wants him running the CIA Show and Dark Army of JSOC and in all likelihood, private contractors.

Zo. What is a poor President to do about this…’tension’ among the State Dept., the Pentagon, and the CIA?

Well, again according to the Washington Post, (ha!) the CIA will get a free pass on the rules and protocols the ‘playbook’ will allegedly require (and boy, I hope we get to see that puppy one day soon) for a year or two, they’ll decide later… Citing the dangers of the purported pullout from Afghanistan, it’s been deemed wise to ‘put the pedal to the metal’ and blow the hell out of Taliban (good and bad), those engaging in suspicious ‘signature-strike’ movements. Those strikes were deemed supremely successful by Brennan; 2011 was replete with them. There has been a new ‘flurry of them in Pakistan, and intent to do far more in the near future. ‘The enemy is no longer just al Qaeda, either. And as far as transparency, it’s hard to imagine. As usual, the recent dozens of assassinations in Afghanistan as per PressTV notes the different versions of the ‘are they militants’ or ‘were they civilians?’ differential.

Karzai’s curliqued statements on drone attacks make sense given that some are for Afghan consumption, others just to save his own skin. Mentioning Imran Khan’s objections seemed worthy, as the former soccer star is the most popular politician in Pakistan, and might even become the next Prime Minister. I couldn’t remember where I’d read that, so my keyboard went a-googling, only to discover that he’s being harassed and detained, and was again as recently as October 28. According to Glenn Greenwald:

“On Saturday, Khan boarded a flight from Canada to New York in order to appear at a fundraising lunch and other events. But before the flight could take off, US immigration officials removed him from the plane and detained him for two hours, causing him to miss the flight. On Twitter, Khan reported that he was “interrogated on [his] views on drones” and then added: “My stance is known. Drone attacks must stop.” He then defiantly noted: “Missed flight and sad to miss the Fundraising lunch in NY but nothing will change my stance.” [snip]

There are several obvious points raised by this episode. Strictly on pragmatic grounds, it seems quite ill-advised to subject the most popular leader in Pakistan – the potential next Prime Minister – to trivial, vindictive humiliations of this sort. It is also a breach of the most basic diplomatic protocol: just imagine the outrage if a US politician were removed from a plane by Pakistani officials in order to be questioned about their publicly expressed political views. And harassing prominent critics of US policy is hardly likely to dilute anti-US animosity; the exact opposite is far more likely to occur.

But the most important point here is that Khan’s detention is part of a clear trend by the Obama administration to harass and intimidate critics of its drone attacks. As Marcy Wheeler notes, “this is at least the third time this year that the US has delayed or denied entry to the US for Pakistani drone critics.”

How is that you spell fuck the Obama administration again? Cuius regio, eius religio, or: Whose realm, his religion. Staggering.

Over six in ten Americans support drone strikes in a recent Pew Poll; I’ve read numbers as high as 68%. Not a rare breed, it seems, the assholus extraordinarus.

* James Bridle has created a new drone expose website called Dronestagram.

** You can read some human rights groups’ objections to ‘the playbook’ here.

It was recently brought to my attention that the President spoke to the nation after the students and teachers were murdered at Sandyhook Elementary. It seem that he read the first names of the twenty children aloud one…by one…and then announced that “God has called them all home.” He then finished by saying, “May He grace those we still have with His holy comfort, and may He bless and watch over this community and the United States of America.”

In his op-ed “God” Who? at Counterpunch, the Reverend William Alberts crossly asks:

What about the children in Iraq and Afghanistan and Pakistan and Yemen and Somalia, who are victims of U. S. drone strikes? These nameless Other are not “called home by God,” but blasted into eternity by the Obama administration’s immoral, sovereignty-violating drone policy. In outraged Pakistan alone, a reported 2,562-3,325 people have been killed by U.S. drone strikes from 2004 to late 2012, “of whom 474-881 were civilians, including 176 children . . . [with the] injured an additional 1.228-1,362 individuals, according to the Stanford/NYU study.” [snip]

(courtesy of lauras_eye via flickr.com)

The nameless Other and their children are actually victims of an American “God.” A “God who will show up at the end of President Obama’s speeches in his words, “God bless the United States of America”– tried and true codes words for American exceptionalism. And “God” will bless America; for America’s unchallenged military power now even fills the skies, allowing it to live in a parallel universe, determining right and wrong, with a “kill list” of who lives and who dies. Subtly, in this ethnocentric mindset, with much verbal and silent Christocentric blessing and acquiescence, there is little distinction between “God” and America. They become one and the same in the for-power- and-profit global “war on terror.”

Yes; again: Cuius regio, eius religio, or: Whose realm, his religion.

Unchallenged ethnocentric mindset: American Exceptionalism authored by ‘God’; thank you Reverend Alberts. And thank you as well for pushing me to find a list of the children who have been murdered by drones in Pakistan and Yemen. I haven’t been able to locate one for the many who’ve been killed in Afghanistan, so please allow this favorite photo of mine stand for all the children who’ve been murdered by Hellfire Missile in Afghanistan. (He hasn’t been, as far as I know.)

It is far too important a revelation that it brings to the light not to be … there.

My youngest, Aja, aged twelve and a half, asked me, on the drive to school this morning, “Dad, are we killing children? Are we killing children over oil, are we doing that? Why are we doing anything like that? How can we?”

I felt that I had to tell, and share with her, the truth, as I perceive it.

I said.

Yes. Yes we are killing children and mothers and fathers, and it is not merely for oil, it is so that we can control as much of the world as our weapons will permit us to do. As to the larger, “Why?”, it is, I think, because too many of us, who live in this country, do not know about these killings, some do not care to know, and some, I fear, actually believe that it is the right thing to do. You know that I do not think it is right or reasonable, or even forgivable, but I think, perhaps, the sad truth is that we simply do not, right now, know any better.”

“That is terrible”, she replied.

Yes, it is terrible and it is very wrong. But soon, I hope that enough people who live in this country, including you and others your age, will find some way to encourage the end of killings like these, to be replaced with love and respect for others, with sharing and caring. I think that is what we all have work for, to try to bring about … doing that, and caring about our planet are things which your generation, and the rest of us, will have to consider very important, maybe the most important things that we, you and I, can possibly do, can think about.

“I see … Dad, I really know what you mean”, she said.

She does see, and her quick and compassionate understanding is one of those things, one of those reflections, which give me hope, which permit me to imagine that human beings may yet find their way out of mindless destruction, unfettered greed, and the deadly search for complete control over others.

Forgive my digression, wendy, but this post hits very close to home and heart. And, I needed to share with you something which I know that you, as a parent, would understand.

As much as I love and appreciate your thoughts and comments i think as a country we know, just like the good Germans knew, but we enjoy being the slave master for capitalism . Slave masters are void of humanity, they have to be for their paychecks.

Look at the approval ratings increasing for using torture. zerodarkthirty grossed $ 16 million last weekend for example. You and i are dinosaurs when it comes to compassion and a shred of humanity. The new unending war to wipe out Islam is just another white man’s crusade to control and relish murder , torture ,kidnapping (rendition) and wholesale slaughter of a million iraq citizens to reenforce the point we’re the most badass country bar none. Keep up your great comments as we wander into the wilderness for the rest of our lifetimes. Namaste.

They watch this guy do bad things and then his regular old life things,” said Col. Hernando Ortega, the chief of aerospace medicine for the Air Education Training Command, who helped conduct a study last year on the stresses on drone pilots. “At some point, some of the stuff might remind you of stuff you did yourself. You might gain a level of familiarity that makes it a little difficult to pull the trigger.

How do you know Colonel, this guy did bad things? More importantly, even if he did “bad things” do you ever wonder if the reason he’s doing bad (is it bad, or merely suspicious?) things is because you’re flying drones over his homeland? Is he using his wife and children as human shields, or just living in his suburbia, like you? What bad things did Abdulrahman al-Awlaki do? If your “precision strike” takes out what might be a bad guy according to your flawed intel, what good is it if it assuredly creates a handful of people who hate you? The blowback from this shit is going to be immeasurable. You’re not excising the cancer, you’re aggravating and thereby promoting it, and THIS American DOESN”T appreciate murder in my country’s name.

There are those who will take this to levels unthinkable unless stopped.
Miniature drones flying through windows, photo ID you, chase you down and blow you away with a single shot to the head. The advancement would be we wouldn’t have “collateral” dead children to moralize over therefore blessing a cruel inhumane policy.

They would have chosen to be born to christian parents instead of Islamic parents, See it’s all their fault for choosing wrong.

Maybe one way of bringing home exactly what these drone killing mean is by speaking of the Obama Administration’s death squad activity. That draws an accurate link to the proxy death squads in El Salvador and Guatemala of 30 years ago supported in the name of “democracy” by the Reagan Administration — except that the U.S.A. wasn’t directly doing the targeting and killing, as far as we know. The Republicans warned us of supposed “death panels,” but we got openly proclaimed death squads instead. Thank you for a most important article!

“Over six in ten Americans support drone strikes in a recent Pew Poll; I’ve read numbers as high as 68%. Not a rare breed, it seems, the assholus extraordinarus.”

It’s simple.

The USA is an extremely violent country. Look no futher than its treatment of its own, of American citizens, in a manner approved by many, maybe most Americans.

It still carries out the death penalty, even applying it to people who are incapable of forming intent, even for people proven to be innocent. A year or two ago a supreme court judge said guilt or innocence was irrelevant on a death penalty case being appealed.

It allow millions to go without healthcare. and thousands to die yearly as a result.

It allows virtually any person to own almost any kind of weapon he or she wants, to freely carry it in public, even in some places into drinking establishments. And notwithstanding massacres, (two more in the last day or two) many American people are ok with that. I heard a guy on the radio from North Dakota say he needed big ammo magazines, cause it was too much trouble to change them when he was varmint hunting.

It locks people up for life, for stealing a few dollars worth of property.

It grabs a Canadian citizen in an airport, sends him to Syria, where he is tortured and kept in a dark coffin sized room for a year, and then says, “Too bad, tough that you were born in Syria” leaving the Canadian government to try to compensate him

It has a law that states that if a stone throwing Mexican child on the border with the USA is killed or injured by shots fired by American law enforcement person, that child has no rights to pursue against the American person shooting across the border into Mexico.

It has vigilantes patrolling it’s southern border, shooting down migrant workers, and getting away with it.

need I go on?

America is completely, sickeningly violent, and many of its citizens approve.

I’ve had an Martin Luther heart starting with refusing to participate in the Vietnam slaughter . I graduated High School with the highest hopes for a great future only to come home to the news that Robert Kennedy was assassinated while I gave the valedictory. Still I hope and work to see that hope take hold.

Welcome, hotdog, and thank you for the link. And yes, it is having blowback even on some of the console operators. Did you know they make them wear uniforms now? It’s a form of insanity we wouldn’t have dreamt, and now it’s becoming…codified, normalized…this President can even make jokes about it. Asshole.

Reminds me of dear old Rasputin dispensing his fatuous wisdom to the hapless Tsar:

Military calamities were often attributed by the Russian public to Rasputin’s baleful influence: as such it therefore deflected direct criticism away from the Tsar himself.

But in corroding America you can see lunacy wherever you look:

Having a playbook on assassinations [... will not] be of any help in weighing larger important issues such as whether such a killing is likely to generate more future anti-U.S. terrorism because of the anger over collateral casualties than it will prevent taking a bad guy out of commission.

Ah, you see, all the pragmatic Eichmanns really want the best … it’s only the Republicans who keep them from judicious execution of the Fuerher’s noble ambition.

Congratulations, America, you’re building an exceptional Hell in your citadel.

Will people remember the death squads, Margo? Yes, the US at least trained and funded them; the Maryknolls are stilling watching the School of the Americas. Wasn’t there a second Occupy Fort Benning in 2012?

I’m trying to find any little thread to hang on to here, given that my tendency is to agree with mafr (comment 11). I’m intrigued by the idea of someone reading these names aloud, in public, or putting each one on a sign or something, anything, to acknowledge that we know about this and at least some of us DO NOT APPROVE – at least some of us are ashamed, sick at heart, furious, horrified that we’re not all out in the streets screaming our lungs out about this.

Thank you, wendydavis, for your courage in looking into the void. It’s so much easier not to.

I know mafr; i wrote about my thinking on the ‘whys’ of it recently. Our task is huge to help people fill their spiritual holes with Light, not shopping or overarching hate and blame as their raison d’etre.

The rest of the world is astonished.

A friend who lives in Switzerland wrote a piece last year that he ended with ‘America, the world waits and watches you in fear and concern’.

Most music is anathema to me lately, but today…I found this helpful, and I think you led me to Emily Barker. Thank you, amigo.

There are days I can believe we can help the police find their humanity, but other days…seeing how many former military are in their ranks, I admit that my spirits can flag. And yet, we must, when the Idle No More drum heartbeats grow greater and begin to lub-dub through the earth into people’s souls, and they begin to senses the hollowness of their lives and reflexive choices, and help us subvert the machine.

Whoosh; that was another wretched day, tjbs, in a long series of them stealing our hope. Yes, loving who we can and making community is one thing open to us. Wasn’t it lovely to read Reverend Alberts’ words and know there are Christians who are that angry about Obomba’s hypocrisy?

I rather goofily used to keep a file of the churches that supported OWS; social gospel helped the civil rights struggles immeasurably.

What we need is a million Medea Bejamins, yes? And two million pissed off Indigenous joining two million Occupiers and two two million pissed off working people exhorting millions of Turtle Island youth to resist!

love to you, Miz Firecracker, and welcome.
p.s. I did not bring the pages of photos of dead darlings.

Nothing eloquent today, wendydavis, just thanks for putting this together. Took me three visits to read through the whole thing, not a criticism, I just read it in pieces.

Thanking you for the music links, yesterday and I almost put up before I refreshed the page and saw your music @27, “A Dream Like Mine,” a choice for flagging spirits on some days. This is becoming a deja vu all over again. Wavelengths.

Exactly. And once more begin to know that they’re enslaved, they’ll want their freedom no? Next financial crash, who knows what, when? Guess that’s why I spend so much time with the Indigenous online: they know what capitalist colonization wrought, and have known it far longer than we have…and goddam, they are comin’ alive globally.

Nice to be on a similar wavelength with you, nonquixote. And Bruce…is another kindred spirit; a great choice for this thread. Thank you thrice for reminding us of that great one. But yes, ‘Closer to the Light’ seemed just right for Scarecrow.

Added: and thank you for welcome Llona to the Lake; where were my manners?

My youngest already thinks that she might wish to live elsewhere, RachelX.

My concern is that we must all realize that this nation, the USA, will NOT be taking a leading role in preserving either the earth or the human species, yet we must not imagine that there are not other human beings, elsewhere in this world, who will resist, successfully I hope, the threats and coercions of our “exceptionalism” … although sometimes, I admit, I worry that the propensities of this nation will overwhelm the world and force everyone to the same nasty and brutish end.

I have four children, all daughters, all very talented and very aware, all articulate and and deeply concerned with the sate of their world. All are well-read, deeply thoughtful, and of all and each of them, I am fiercely proud.

My roots, my family history in this nation, reach back to well before it became a nation, yet I well understand that some, or all, of my children may well have to seek refuge and sanity in other lands, among human beings more friendly to my daughters’ conscience and courage, to their essential humanity. All of my white ancestors, weere they English, French, Dutch, German, Irish, or Scandinavian, came to this land seeking either religious freedom or economic opportunity (call it bluntly, the opportunity to survive …), my native American ancestors provide me roots even deeper. We, all of us, have similar histories, those of us now living in this nation, all of us came here or were brought here, even dragged here, many of us, against our will. And now, many are oblivious to what is being done in their names, some may even be proud of what they “believe” to be the truth of this nation, that it is a kind nation, a generous nation, a nation which helps and “defends” other nations and peoples. You and I are not oblivious, neither are we smitten with the mythologies which literally enslave the awareness and conscience of others. When I was young, growing up in the late nineteen-forties and early nineteen-fifties, the two primary narratives that my education presented me were of the destructive pathology of Nazi Germany and of the appalling horrors which the German people inflicted upon others, primarily, as the second narrative stressed, the Jewish people. Every other week, we were shown films of one or other of those two major stories, interspersed with films about the powerful weapon possessed, at that time, for a while, by the US, alone. Even as we were instructed about the compliance of the “good Germans” with the “final solution”, we were being told, in the event of a nuclear attack, which would come we were told, from the Russians, who “hated us”, that we would be safe under our desks.

Not for a moment could I “believe” such nonsense, for I had seen the films and understood that if the “shock wave” did not immediately destroy any structures near its detonation point, that the intense heat, would have very dire consequence for people and buildings and that, then … the radiation would claim many more victims, slowly, over time. I looked hard at the adults who stood before me and my classmates and told us that safety was to be found “under your desks”. How could they believe such things? How could they think that we would believe them? I realize now, that some, perhaps many children believed, or wanted to believe, but I simply could not readily accept what I was being told. I do not know how old you might be, Rachel, yet I suspect that, in whatever time you grew up, you too, perceived the lies of adults, or the sugar-coated “explanations”, and you too came to know who the “enemy” of your childhood was perceived to be.

Many of us are long-time skeptics, many of us grew up understanding or even participating in the Civil Rights struggle, or joined the protests against the “war” in Vietnam, a “war” begun on the basis of lies and deceit.

Many more of our fellow citizens, however, accepted most, if not all, of what they were told, even as many, today, “believe” that the US is “good”, that our leadership “cares”, and that capitalism is not merely benign, but the one true economic system … even as it is “believed” that this is a “Christian nation” engaged in a death struggle with fanatical Muslims and godless Communists.

Perhaps the many will come to see that they have been manipulated to “believe”, to close their minds and hearts and accept what they are told? Perhaps they “believe” that they are more “secure” when they give up “rights” that seem arcane, or useless, or even silly and dangerous to them, the right of assembly, of speech, of redress of grievance? Perhaps they “believe” that taking fifteen minutes to “vote” constitutes the very essence of “democracy?

Perhaps it will take the horror of war, up close, personal and here, in the “Homeland”, for understanding to dawn, for true understanding to come?

I do not know. I wonder.

Will it require what Germany once experienced?

My children may, of necessity, wander, but I know that they already understand what many around them do not, that life is the most precious thing about finding ourselves on this wee, almost perfect planet, in the vast immensity of universe, that life is to be lived, to be explored and made journey’s use of, that skill and talent, perhaps even genius, are to be discovered … in oneself and in others, that love and community matter, that life is short and uncertain for all living things, but that life is what THIS, this BEING, this POSSIBILITY, is all about.

It is NOT about money. It is not about power.

Whatever the many caught in the trap of the United States might think, imagine. or “believe”.

Beyond that is “karma”, the consequence of our own choices, deliberate and intentional, or simply “gone along with” …

Thank you, thank you wendydavis for again comprehensively focussing on this ongoing horror – I especially agree with this:

“In his op-ed “God” Who? at Counterpunch, the Reverend William Alberts crossly asks:

What about the children in Iraq and Afghanistan and Pakistan and Yemen and Somalia, who are victims of U. S. drone strikes? These nameless Other are not “called home by God,” but blasted into eternity by the Obama administration’s immoral, sovereignty-violating drone policy. In outraged Pakistan alone, a reported 2,562-3,325 people have been killed by U.S. drone strikes from 2004 to late 2012, “of whom 474-881 were civilians, including 176 children . . . [with the] injured an additional 1.228-1,362 individuals, according to the Stanford/NYU study.” [snip]”

Someone has to shout out from the crowd when Obama starts this exceptionalism rant “Blessed be the children you kill!”. It demeans our own personal mourning to have it distorted by these faux litanies – and they are faux!

Good on you, Reverend Alberts! Good on you!

Keep on keeping on, wendy – people are beginning to listen. (I take heart that the Sierra Club is latching on in a teensy way to OWS tactics. Bravo to them, too! Now if we can just get the AMA to go disobedient over the killing of children…

[Minor clarification: Imran Khan is/was a cricketer par excellence - we don't currently have any sportspersons we adore(thanks to the greed of the 1% percolating down) but think back to - no, we don't have anyone of his standing; he's an international star, known all around the world because cricket goes all around the world - except here.]

Wendy, Thank you for this post and especially for the list of children who have been killed. They have no less intrinsic value than the children of Sandy Hook & should be remembered and mourned.

It seems to me that one of the reasons that this hateful & murderous policy is accepted by many Americans is that for some, the idea of women and children is too abstract. I like the idea of posting signs with the names or public readings (thanks hotflashcarol). Perhaps it will make it more substantial for those who have trouble making the connection to actual people whose lives were cut short.

Is it ok with you if I use the list? For sure to post on my site: OurWorldReport but I will also give some thought to how else it might be useful to wake up the folks that refuse to see, do not want to see, or are swayed by the arguments by the likes of John Brennan to not see the moral, ethical, and spiritual significance.

Ah, tjbs, what a searing experience for you! It was bad enough for those of us who were adults at the time. Had he lived, what a difference he most certainly would have made to this country’s future, and the world’s.

And now we have become the assassinator in chief. How many potential leaders of their country have we killed today?

Answering required me to go outside and stand for a bit, RachelX, and by the way, welcome to the Lake to you as well.

Yes, it can/could be excruciating to contemplate. If I explain what I saw, it will make no sense at all to you, I think.

But the sun is sinking in the west, and one ray of light played on the swing-set out yonder. I saw my three young grandchildren on the sky-scooter and the slide and swings laughing, and remembered the old blacksmith who gave me the set. A hundred hours I may have sent sanding and painting it, digging the holes for the concrete to anchor it, all during my own children’s nap times.

And I held them all in light because I cannot allow myself to believe anything other than we have the power to turn this all around…if we only will. To say I’d give my life for them if it helped would sound absurd (though I would in a Milwaukee minute); for now, they need their grammy alive, and speaking the truth, even if it’s only online.

Rachel means ‘little lamb’; as humans, we need to love and value all the little lambs that may they grow into their authentic and creative selves, and help us dream a better world. And in the meantime, get our asses in gear, and do all we can do now.

The powers that be are deliberate in having no real intentions of raising any backward country, as you phrase it, up.

I certainly could have been more accurate to state that the hippies were easy to blame for the downfall of our country during a particular generation, a convenient target, a foil, instead of trying to be cute with the language.

Whoosh, julianai; I’d been collecting links and quotes for this piece for several days, and Reverend Alberts just kicked my ass to find the names. I’d been about to write a piece from one of the children’s eyes and heart, and realized that the names…the names that meant lives we might imagine, was The Thing. To say the truth, I’d build it upside down at first, with the Memoriam first, then swapped it out so that the song would be the denouement that might inspire further reverie.

Yes, blast him with it until he can’t avoid hearing it anywhere, any day! Thank you.

Good comment, FeetToDaFire, and your site looks great. Of course, please use it, spread it widely. Remember the folks who did the installation art with the boots representing the dead soldiers? This idea would turn that on its head, wouldn’t it? Make it so!

Is it an occasional flat that makes it so unusual? I love Karen Daltons gritty songs, but…I still can’t get her to load on to my RealPlayer, and…er..tend to forget her name when I try to find her on youtube.

I suspect that, in whatever time you grew up, you too, perceived the lies of adults, or the sugar-coated “explanations”

Perhaps I knew in some contorted way, but no child can understand the depravity arising in the human experiment. My own parents were dutiful and optimistic despite their cause to doubt. By the age of parenthood it still is very difficult to comprehend our predicament, though one of mine was already disgusted by the customary weapon of damnation.

Congratulations on your sure footing and your daughters’ fortune. It’s terrifying to see you all on that tightrope, though. Most troubling is how to tell them of the many ways their own lifeline has been sabotaged by the circus owner for his profit.

I will do my best as we all should, to see to it that these innocents don’t die in vain. Not sure what it means to not “die in vain.” I can’t help but think that regardless of any “higher” purpose their death may represent to others, they and their families would rather not have died at all. Huh?

I am not certain it is “faith”, Rachel, it is only the example that my father was honest with me, he supported my interests in Civil Rights, as they were his own, and he supported my views on Vietnam, as he agreed that it was a war without justification, he continued to support my decision when I refused to be inducted and faced prison.

Indeed, my own children might face a prison-like world in this country, which is why I support their interests in life, music, acting, education, and art, AND in living in other countries .. it would be selfish of me to insist that they stay … here.

I have conviction that they will choose paths of fulfillment and meaning, for that is what they have been encouraged to do, since they were small, and curious, and brave.

Since Nine Eleven, the news could be nothing more than an unending set of names. The names of all the service people who died in a given month in Afghanistan. The names of all those who ended up missing after an IED explosion.

And inside the mindset of war, the President continues the devastation. So that this last, and latest list, lets the most innocent of casualties be counted up, too.

And what can ever repair the hurt done to parents and family when young lives are taken? The parents won’t forget. And so we lose the hearts and the minds of people in a region that were told we must convert to our way of life.

While so many American children must fall asleep in their parents’ RV, as the money has been sucked out of the economy and into the War Chest, so this nation can pay for ever yet more drones to turn my skies into war.

My guess is that it would be fairly cold comfort to their families and friends, Feet. But, as you say, for the greater good, and the good of their tender spirits receiving our love, prayers and good thoughts winging them aloft…we can at least do that much. Dear thoughts from you.

Yes, elisemattu. And the vast numbers of deaths in Iraq, many who have suffered in the great diaspora, the babies malformed from depleted uranium and phosphorus bombs…the dying in Iran due to such sever sanctions medicines are scarce…the traumatized who may never find peace again. Yes, so many lists, so many names, so much ‘national treasure’ which proves there’s always more for war and devastation, not for us, no.

The desperation of the Empire as it ages and decrepitly hobbles toward the finish line…is not pretty, but ordained by history. Do the fools in charge know what’s ahead? Do they plan their escapes to Abu Dhabi already? Probably, the ones whose fortunes are already stashed out of country.

“…so this nation can pay for ever yet more drones to turn my skies into war.” Nice personalization, dear.

Ben Emmerson QC, a UN special rapporteur, “One of the questions we will be looking at is whether, given the local demography, aerial attacks carry too high a risk of a disproportionate number of civilian casualties.”

One cannot help but wonder what a “proportionate” number of civilian casualties might be “acceptable” to the UN in countries “where the UN has not formally recognized that there is a conflict … for that matter, one wonders how many civilian casualties are “acceptable” to the UN in countries where the UN has “recognized” that there is a “conflict”?

Firedoglake, the community, has great and moral need of this post, as do all of the people of the nation known as the United States of America.

I do not see how, in good conscience, what it contains and reflects, can be ignored or pushed to the side.

There comes a time … when evasions, semantic or otherwise, of the truth can do nothing to avoid that truth and the stark reality which attends it.

It is time for the good people of this nation to learn what is being done in their name and, having learned the truth, to refrain from silence, to find the conscience and courage to speak to that truth … and to each other.

Ben Emmerson seems to have a long history in the human rights field, and working to ensure fair trials for ‘terror suspects’. I’d wondered if he might be a US puppet like the new head of the IAEA, Yukiya Amano. ;o)

My cynical side says that the US will sure open up its files and drone films to an outside agency./s There’s a reason the US isn’t a member of the ICC, yes? There does seem to be some ‘concern’ over the legalities of drone assassinations and the civilian deaths (so commonly referred to as ‘bugsplat’ = ‘Oops!’), and there are plenty of nations who don’t care for them, and plenty more nations that want Reapers, etc., that orders are backed up pretty far.

The article says that if Emmerson recommends it, the US must answer, etc., but the answers may already be slyly contained in the ‘playbook’. The out clause seems to be ‘without disclosing classified information’, which the military and this administration has even used to prevent those on trial mounting their own defenses.

Of course, let him investigate! But as David asks, what might be an acceptable ratio, especially when the US has already decided that anyone they describe as ‘a militant’ due to age, nearness to another ‘Bad Guy’, Taliban now = al Qaeda, etc., *plus* they seem to be making an attempt to codify all this as reasonable and legal, international law torqued to their own purposes or disregarded.

As both the US and China continue their quests to obtain the vast resources in Africa, not only Africom, but drones, will be on the march (if I can mix metaphors).

(Wow, what a sourpuss I am this mornin’, bluebutterfly. Sorry; there were some badass authoritarians hauntin’ my dreams last night…let’s blame it on them, lol.)

During 2012 when Barack Obama was being defended here at FDL by some who seemed uninterested in hearing about Obama’s war crimes being that did not fit in with the expressed desire to re-elect Barack Obama the above list would have likely not altered this Obama must be re-elected no matter what premise.

Barack Obama does belong in a jailhouse not the WH. Who would/could still suggest after seeing the list wd presents above that Barack Obama does not belong in a jailhouse instead of the WH?

If one is going to place comments agreeing that what the list wd shows above is terrible and innocents are now dead because an American President would not stop killing innocents and will not stop killing innocents but then turn around and defend Barack Obama because Obama is a D POTUS this reveals a lack of personal and political integrity.

If one is going to post comments agreeing with view that the above list of dead humans describes war crimes but then turnaround and defend Barack Obama,Joe Biden,Hillary Clinton and Leon Panetta because they are Ds? Or this somehow needs to be accepted because American Empire has some kind of self assigned license to kill innocents while other nations do not get to do so? The hypocrisy of conduct this describes is stunning in the duplicity it seeks to enable.

What are we become? Excellent question asked by DWB.

Thanks wd for posting the above diary and the list of names of human beings now dead it presents — needless to say the humans who names are on it will not be able to engage the killer(s) who saw fit to end their lives to accuse him/them of being a war criminal or war criminals.

Those who seek to defend Barack Obama by employing compartmentalized politics because it allows them to play the game both ways are shameless in doing so. Not deserving of respect. Deserving of contempt.

Your comment was directed to DW, arrow, but if I’d like to respond to it as well.

I can only agree with your assessment of people here who make excuses for Obomba’s re-election, and the ‘Romney would be worse’ argument pales given the difference between ‘known’ evil and ‘projected’ evil. How many here have said that Romney has advocated for torture, and claimed that this President has summarily ended it? Now, sometimes statements like that cause me to think that there might be a bubble they live in if they haven’t read Kevin’s work (that far too often goes begging for comments, mine included), or at the Readers Diaries. I know I wrote about this when I covered this piece at the New York Times when it came out, and highlighted the sections proving that Obomba and his fucked up ‘legal team’ simply redefined rendition (as it’s my thread, I feel comfortable pasting at length ;o) :

The day before the executive orders were issued, the C.I.A.’s top lawyer, John A. Rizzo, had called the White House in a panic. The order prohibited the agency from operating detention facilities, closing once and for all the secret overseas “black sites” where interrogators had brutalized terrorist suspects.

“The way this is written, you are going to take us out of the rendition business,” Mr. Rizzo told Gregory B. Craig, Mr. Obama’s White House counsel, referring to the much-criticized practice of grabbing a terrorist suspect abroad and delivering him to another country for interrogation or trial. The problem, Mr. Rizzo explained, was that the C.I.A. sometimes held such suspects for a day or two while awaiting a flight. The order appeared to outlaw that.

Mr. Craig assured him that the new president had no intention of ending rendition — only its abuse, which could lead to American complicity in torture abroad. So a new definition of “detention facility” was inserted, excluding places used to hold people “on a short-term, transitory basis.” Problem solved — and no messy public explanation damped Mr. Obama’s celebration.

“Pragmatism over ideology,” his campaign national security team had advised in a memo in March 2008. It was counsel that only reinforced the president’s instincts.

But how much simpler it is to believe WH talking points, and move on. Same with his Gitmo bullshit.

I dunno what O’s defenders here say about these deeds as war crimes, so I can’t comment on that.

And oh, crap; while digging up that piece on TT, I bumped into this one in the google cache, goddam it. It’s on the ‘disposition matrix‘; just a quick scan’s depressed the hell out of me. The bits I quoted are so on topic to the ‘how long will this go on?’ question.

And that’s the kind of answer that this administration will give Ben Emmerson. Grrr. But Pew Global indicates that in 17 out of 20 nations polled, over half those questioned were against the US drone program. Yeah, who are the other half? And what exact question were they asked?

And you were so right in going with the names, wendy. I paint icons, and I was always taught that it is the names and not the visual aspects we artists may see that are the real presence therein. The names their parents found for them when these little ones were born, that they still embody, even now in hearts and minds agonizing over their loss., in loving memory as we say. The names are a litany, a prayer just saying them.

wendydavis – When I’ve been out of pocket and drop back into FDL, I’ll scan the front page, check The Dissenter and almost always find that you have timed one of your gems on My FDL while I was away. As I am usually late to the “party” I may not comment, but recommending is an easy click away. This morning I’ll be different.

Edith Wharton once said, “There are two ways of spreading light…To be the candle or the mirror that reflects it.” I can’t think of a better example of that idea than your piece, or the insightful comments and conversation that follows from “the usual suspects”. This will give the black shirted trolls in Utah something interesting to read, of course they won’t understand. Heartfelt thanks to you and to everyone in the conversation.

And your icons are simply wonderful, juliania, and interesting that you were taught the names were so key to grokking the work; I’d never imagined that.

That you’re copying down their names in your prayer book is just one of the reasons we love you. ‘A litany, a prayer just reading them.’ Yes.

Mr. wd said this morning that when he read their names something burst apart in him, and his rage became almost boundless. My rage is entwined with grief and…the mountains we must cross to change these murders, stop the war criminals, as arrow puts it so well.

Would that I had half the commenting talent so many of you here do: look at this thread!

All I can manage to listen to again today is Yusuf’s choir and this Emily Barker and the Red Clay Halo: ‘The Rains’.

Well said, shootthatarrow. It has become clear to me that there is the same shock and horror in our cleareyed vision of this man that I find in the contemplation of the young man held up to our gaze here in New Mexico who has slain not only his parents (that happens, sadly) but his younger siblings, among them a two year old. The bloody veil flutters over both of them, the gauze of technological remoteness, the curse of our age when everything is computer’friendly’ and blackberries tell you if the deed is doable and ultimately accomplished – and you sit in dark places alone and contemplate these dark deeds The buck doesn’t stop there; it trickles down, black drop upon dark bloody drop.

People here in New Mexico are saying, no, that poor young man is not a monster. His church is praying for him.

But monsters set the agenda now. And even a child of fifteen has been blighted by it all. Our children are fed this claptrap about military heroism in the face of the murder of innocents, and the disconnect is destroying their minds – never more so than the false meme that we are ‘safer’ because we can kill at a distance.

You see, God doesn’t watch from a distance; as DW points out, he’s right here with our kids, in their questionings. And yes, we are killing children.

Just for the sake of posterity, then 16-year-old Tariq Aziz is on the Pakistan list. Not long after he died, I wrote this diary for him, for his relatives…and for those of us who might care. I’s poked around for a couple days to try to find what his life may have been like, how he might have spoken (supremely politely to his Elders) given the area he came from, what a funeral may have been like, etc.

to Arrow: I’ve been mulling over some of your comments, and need to say that I’m pretty sure no one on this thread would have voted for Obomba, if they voted at all (nodding to hotdog). ;o)

But while musing on Dr. King’s ways to ‘love our enemies’, it occurred to me that some of us who are not a bit amused by Obomba or his re-election (to say the least) have been treated as enemies here, with the concomitant name-calling, etc.

I just scanned a post here that maintained that no Republicans or Tea People could pass a psychological screening to own a gun, and that sort of tribalist good-bad thinking is seriously unhealthy, imo. And the putative left seems to engage in it about itself. I know some treat online political discussions as miniature war games or something, but boy, howdy, does the crux of a discussion get blown out of the water early on that way.

As well, not all of us have the elegance DW and juliania do in trying to communicate as Socrates might have, so we shorthand things a bit, and get called trolls. ;o)

It’s sad that so many “Lefties” who vote confidently and enthusiastically for Obama, Clinton, Biden et al, don’t think their RW neighbors could pass a psychological profile and test. The only reason that I am here typing this is because of the generosity of RW neighbors, who might be slightly (or even totally) nuts about WMD’s, wars against third world people, etc, but who are totally willing to help out someone in dire financial need. While your liberal, affluent Democratic folks are more, “Gee you should have saved up more money so you wouldn’t have had that medical bankruptcy hit your household.” Those Dems seem to think the only humans worthy of being helped are newly arrived immigrants, but other folks born in America, not so much.

I find some peace here, amidst the necessary outrage so many folks here express with such eloquence.

When I can read that other people are suffering, and expressing their concerns about the twists of our corrupted leaders, when other people are angry, then I can find some peace, because I really can’t find peace when I am thinking how I must be nuts for being the only one that sees the people behind the curtain.

FDL lets me know I am not alone. I may be depressed, angry, sad, concerned, but others here understand the same things, and their hearts are shattered also. I guess the hope is that together we can figure a way out of all this tragic distortion.

Boy, do I hear that, elisemattu. We live among Mormons, old cowboys, farmers and many Republicans. With a few exceptions, of course (some Mormons mainly support their own), and some assholes, when someone’s in dire straits, we help em out. Fundraisers, food help, whatever. Sometimes we’re skipped over, but that may be because word hasn’t gone out abroad, I dunno.

But one-on-one is exactly where you can make a difference. We’ve been here…gads, since 1973, and we’re still ‘the hippies’, but the community learned to count on our hard work for community projects, etc. Hell, they even asked me to be the Girl Scout leader in ’77, lol (no, but thank ya so much…).

It’s a Republican county, as so assholes may be on the rise politically, but our town went downhill as the latte libruls started doin’ their thang. They wanna live in a place cool enough to wear Dickensian costumes and feather boas to the (restored, but crap) old Mancos Opera House. The real salt-of-the-earth cowboys have been leavin’ in droves as the land taxes went up to fund all the stuff they wanted. Happens all over Colorado, but…hey, try to get uranium mill tailings cleaned up…not so many takers.

No, you are not alone, especially at the Dissenter and My.fdl. We’re mad, we’re sad, and we aim to keep our voices tuned to the music of the people, and inspire them (the absurdity of being a keyboard warrior notwithstanding, lol).

I am notorious for leaving my communication/tracking device turned off or at home (no really that mandated GPS is there for YOUR security), and friends have started using my “being out of pocket” colloquialism for being away. I went to Tulsa with some friends for a small gathering the day your diary hit.

Bonus points for picking up on the Utah reference, I guess I’ll have to be more cryptic in my NSA allusions. (groan)

Uh-oh; just leads to a red-faced guy with a crooked mouth with no cigar. Silly person, I dinnae mean to bust ya on the Utahans; but remember: they have a lot of shit to (not) analyze, so…we’re safe. Uh-oh, again: I blog in my own name…or do I…?

Tulsa? Well, take me back! (Yeah, I know, if ya mention you come from or are goin’ to Fargo… ;o)

Zounds; same with me: wendydavis is an anagram for my name letters, too! ;o)

Well, I love her. That keyboard I mistook at first with mine bad eyes for a pedal steel…I thought I’d heard one in the intro. Maybe the keyboard can sound like one.

I had this great dream the other night that my former singing partner was doing a gid with her now-partner, and they were performing in a small, airy and light room with a small swimming pool. No visible instruments, but music…and they stood tight against each other in front of one mike at the edge of the pool, just bright with magnetism and smilin’ fun. They’d arranged their song/s far better than we’d ever thunk of… all of sudden Marilyn dropped head first flat into the water, fooled around, and did the rest of the gig soaking wet, but singin’ like an angel. I woke up grinnin’ like an idiot.

Dunno about male/female, but I sure have been thinking about how during sever times of privation and oppression, artists were just crankin’ out work. Cripes, musically, OWS got Tom Morello? (ish x two)

So we keep goin’ back to the old tunes from the sixties for the most part. Same with the authors and poets, though maybe I just miss the good new stuff. Nat Turner at BAR writes some poetry, I guess.

Anyhoo, I’ve been thinking how important it is now, and hopin’ I might be able to conjure up a post about it. Well, actually I’d started one, but I can’t find it on my laptop, crazy old cow. ;o)

Flagged for treason. You will now be extraordinarily renditioned back to England, Scotland, Wales, Ireland or one of those now-English-speaking island countries and be forced to eat their food until you tell the Empire who your terrorist contacts are!

We are NOT calling for the overthrow of the government. In fact, we are calling for the reinstatement of our government.

We are not calling for lawlessness. We are calling for an end to lawlessness and lack of accountability and a return to the rule of law.

Rather than trying to subvert the constitution, we are calling for its enforcement.

We are patriotic Americans born and raised in this country. We love the U.S. We don’t seek to destroy or attack America … we seek to restore her to strength, prosperity, liberty and respect.

As to food-stuffing: I might break before I ate haggis. ;o) At Zuni Pueblo, just the smell of sheepshead stuffed with blue corn and chiles…made me sick, but then…it was served for breakfast. Enough to make any one go off their Cheerios.

But thank you, Mr. Barbarian. We aim to serve.

(by the way: what gave me away? was it the ‘how do you spell fuck the yada yada bit?)

Wendy, I’m sick with sadness and shame at reading all those names. The horror that has been done by our government in our name – the enormity of it, it’s like a force that washes over me. It’s like visiting ‘the wall’ in DC. Think of what a wall would be like with the names of the Vietnamese, it would encircle all of Washington. I have no other words.

Those words say it all, amigo. I experienced much the same. Thank you for being willing to read their names, and give them a bit of life…after death. As juliania said, saying them is a litany; reading them equals a prayer.

During the long days and months of the 2012 WH election season during which the R vs. D junk was unavoidable here at FDL it was possible to pick up on the short hand political leanings and tilts of some/many fellow Lakers. Just paying attention reveals/yields much over time.

One of the more(most?) revealing FDL site 2012 politics “moments” was during an especially heated discussion about not voting for either Mitt Romney or Barack Obama or perhaps voting third party WH candidate ( there were several to pick from ) or just not voting at all as/in way of a direct protest. This last option can/does really bring out heated hostility of the R vs. D gamers as not voting for R vs. D regime unravels the whole edifice of R vs. D politics by denying it legitimacy of democracy and plurality. Pentagon/CIA would not like this one bit in light of the post WW2 regime they have erected around American Empire as done thru R vs. D bipartisan approved American militarism. Seems to be a genuine threat to the R vs. D zealots and promoters which is what would make it if fully implemented a likely best choice I think. :-)

It became very heated on some FDL comments threads as an idea that not voting for Mitt Romney would not/might not transfer then into a vote for Barack Obama with the R vs. D gamers. Suggesting the idea or stating support for just not voting as/in way of protest to the entire sham edifice the Ds and Rs along with mainstream USian political media and corporate money interests promote unceasingly brought on very acute condemnation(s). These comment threads are still/remain viewable in FDL archives.

Lakers like myself who have been around The Lake for a longer time do have a avatar that with many comments has been outlined and shaded in to create a consistent editorial perspective and way of seeing/saying.

A “tell” that I use when evaluating fellow Lakers as to the politics they are wholesaling/retailing has to do with how G.W.Bush is used or not used to frame what POTUS Obama has done/not done since Jan.20,2009.

When I see or note G.W.Bush being mocked/attacked for what G.W.Bush did/did not do as POTUS but then see POTUS Obama being given a soft or complete pass for doing same/similar acts as G.W.Bush did evidently due to Barack Obama being a D POTUS? I do a reset on/about such conduct going forward as to such Lakers political commentaries and evaluations.

We already are seeing early 2016 WH race speculation(s) taking place in the Ds camp with both Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden as potential 2016 WH contestants being suggested/hinted at. In light of the above list of victims with names and ages I would like and hope to see both HC and JB being vigorously confronted about the roles and sign offs they now appear to have done/performed that allowed Barack Obama to do/keep doing these political and imperial killings.

If instead it is going to be another round of compartmentalization in 2016 that allows either or both HC and JB to skate around the serial killing(s) of innocents and children? Or American Empire resisters and anti-AE combatants? Then this will reveal in plain ways how rotted Ds inside game is #1 and how rotted the whole R vs. D sham edifice is #2.

As it is one is on thin ice here at FDL to use or address avatars in direct ways as this is easily branded as outlaw behavior and soon brings on ( in many cases but not always in all cases ) severe FDL site moderation. This generally is done in ways that protect/police the commons here at FDL as needed. I may not agree with site MOD rulings in all examples I have seen of FDL site moderation but understand all the same it goes both ways.

I did not specifically mention anyone/any avatar in the comment I made up thread being that would not likely serve the deeper purpose(s) in seeking to illustrate hypocrisy and duplicity taking place/being done.

If I am still visiting and posting comments here at FDL in 2016 I will be and remain aware of who and what and why considerations in placing respect or integrity values. Will this change much about R vs. D regime politics? Likely not. I will do it for my own self respect and integrity conservation and preservation. Which in the end will be all that I will still have when all is/has been done and said.

Thank you wd for conducting your My FDL diaries comments space so well and openly. This is not always the encountered case here at FDL. :-)

Nice, blueokie; thank you. The photos are wonderful, too. I’d considered using Robbie’s ‘Ghost Dance’ for a recent post on Idle No More, but…I didn’t in the end.

The tipis are clearly made of canvas, not hides, and Mr. wd and I were wondering about that, as in: where they got it all? We reckoned that in any event they didn’t just buy tipi kits from Nomadics, Inc. like we did and sew them together. We went through two our ownselves, lol. First one, we lived in Breckenridge, CO, at 10,000 feet. Idiot hippies. ;o)

Yes to the stuff Dubya did and Obomba vastly expanded: deportations of immigrants, drone assassinations, financial support of Wall Street, wiretapping, security state clampdown, prosecution of whistle-blowers, yada, yada.

Ooh, la la were some of those discussions heated! That so many reflexively claimed that a vote for a third-party candidate was simply a vote for Romney continues to irritate me. It totally disregards the fact that so many here *also* kinda see that it’s a corporatist duopoly that keeps the highjacking of the 95/whatever%’s capital to the upper 1%’s pockets, and as you say, keeps funding wars (even printing more $ for them, even if it’s virtual money.

But so few seem to get that in order for third, fourth parties to take off requires a leap of faith to actually *vote* for one. Yes there’s then always the advice to build the parties from the ground up, etc., but there ain’t time for that, imo. (The ‘don’t vote’ movement I’d have respected more if it had been organized far earlier, and was a true movement as were those in the several nations that were brought up as examples of its efficacy.)

At another site the other day I found this 2008 review of a book by Lance Selfa, The Democrats: a critical history. You’ll no doubt recognize how true these sentences are:

He devotes an entire chapter to explaining how and why the Democrats are just as imperialist as their counterparts across the aisle, and points out that all the major wars of the 20th century were launched by Democratic politicians who claimed to want peace while they prepared for war. The fact that the party that jumped into two world wars, used nuclear weapons, designed the Cold War, and started “small” wars in Korea and Vietnam is seen as being less pro-war than the Republicans is a feat that would impress Karl Rove.

Unlike the Republican party, the Democrats incorporate representatives of the oppressed and exploited (women, blacks, gays, unions) within the party as a subordinate component, to give them a meaningless “seat at the table.” Doing so helps the Democrats maintain the fiction that they are the “party of the people,” or that they’re “friends of labor,” as opposed to the bad big business-backed Republicans. The third chapter is dedicated to looking at the rise of the “New Democrats,” i.e. Bill Clinton and the unapologetically pro-business GOP-lite Democratic Leadership Council that has controlled the party since the 1990s. [snip]

In each case, the Democrats resisted these movements but eventually granted meaningful reforms because these movements became too powerful to crush. These movements ignored pleas by Democratic politicians to moderate their demands, to shut up and wait, and to stop organizing (Attorney General Robert Kennedy, the darling of liberals to this day, told civil rights organizers: “If you stop all this sitting-ins — and concentrate on voter registration, I’ll get you a tax-exemption.”) At the same time, the Democrats worked hard to incorporate and co-opt movement leaders into the machinery of government, to transform organizers into party/government bureaucrats sitting behind desks by offering them jobs.

Sadly, in many cases, the strategy worked. Jesse Jackson, for example, agreed to endorse conservative Democratic loser Michael Dukakis and give him the Rainbow Coalition’s delegates in exchange for putting several Jackson staffers (including Jackson’s son) on the Democratic National Committee. While big business-friendly candidates kept its hands firmly on the wheel of the Democratic Party, progressives and their issues took their seats at the back of the bus. The book is rife with examples of movement leaders that decide a seat at the Democratic table is more important than changing the menu, the portions, or who gets what in this country.

(I hadn’t known that about Robert Kennedy, but…)

Now there are discussions here about the magnificent evidence of the duopolistic nature of the Parties as shown by Harry Reid’s crap mini-tweaks to the filibuster rules in the Senate. What a surprise, sigh. In the meantime, I’ll put most of my energy in the outside movements, and calling fie and foul on what this government’s doing…or not doing, in many cases.

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